Lektion 12 - Past Progressive Tense

Konversationen

City

English

Sarah sees Mary downtown while she is on her lunch break. They stop and talk for a few minutes.

Sarah: I saw you riding your bike yesterday. Where were you going?

Mary: I was going to my Business Communication class. I have a class every Tuesday and Thursday evening.

Sarah: How do you like it?

Mary: I was having trouble at first, but I’m starting to enjoy it now. This is the first course I’ve taken in years, so it took me a while to get used to studying again.

Sarah: Why are you taking the course?

Mary: I want to be a Project Manager. My work will pay for all the courses I need to take to get a Project Management Certificate.

Sarah: Wow! That’s very ambitious. How many courses do you have to take?

Mary: I have to complete ten courses. I was hoping to finish in two years, but I think it will take me a little bit longer.

Sarah: I guess you’re really busy these days.

Mary: Yeah. I have some free time on Saturday though. We should go for coffee.

Sarah: Sure. What time?

Mary: 1:00 at the usual place.

Sarah: See you then.

Mary: Bye.

Deutsch

Sarah sieht Mary in der Innenstadt, während sie in ihrer Mittagspause ist. Sie halten ein paar Minuten an und unterhalten sich.

Sarah: Ich habe gesehen, wie du gestern mit dem Fahrrad gefahren bist. Wo bist du hingegangen?

Mary: Ich ging zu meinem Geschäftskommunikationskurs. Ich habe jeden Dienstag und Donnerstagabend eine Klasse.

Sarah: Wie gefällt es Ihnen?

Mary: Ich hatte zuerst Probleme, aber ich fange jetzt an, es zu genießen. Dies ist der erste Kurs, den ich seit Jahren absolviert habe. Ich habe eine Weile gebraucht, um mich daran zu gewöhnen, wieder zu lernen.

Sarah: Warum belegst du den Kurs?

Mary: Ich möchte Projektmanager werden. Meine Arbeit zahlt alle Kurse, die ich benötigen muss, um ein Projektmanagementzertifikat zu erhalten.

Sarah: Wow! Das ist sehr ehrgeizig. Wie viele Kurse müssen Sie belegen?

Mary: Ich muss zehn Kurse absolvieren. Ich hatte gehofft, in zwei Jahren fertig zu werden, aber ich denke, es wird ein bisschen länger dauern.

Sarah: Ich denke, du bist heutzutage sehr beschäftigt.

Mary: Ja. Ich habe allerdings etwas Freizeit am Samstag. Wir sollten Kaffee trinken.

Sarah: Sicher. Wie viel Uhr?

Mary: 1:00 am üblichen Ort.

Sarah: Bis dann.

Mary: Tschüss.

Vokabeln und Redewendungen

I saw you riding your bike.	Ich habe dich auf deinem Fahrrad gesehen.
I was having trouble ___.	Ich hatte Probleme ___.
ambitious	ehrgeizig
to finish	fertigstellen
busy	beschäftigt
to guess	erraten
We should go ___.	wir sollten gehen

Grammatik

Present Participle

The present participle is a form of a verb that is used in the creation of the progressive tenses. The present participle is formed by adding ing to the end of a verb. If the verb ends in e and is more than three letters, the final e is dropped.

The following table shows some examples of the present participle.

Verb	Present Participle
be	being
do	doing
make	making
see	seeing
think	thinking

The Past Progressive Tense

The past progressive tense, also called past continuous, refers to a continuing action or state that was happening at some point in the past.

It is used to indicate:

that an action was in progress in the past when another action happened
a habitual or repeated action in the past
that an action was in progress during a specific time or period of time in the past.

The past progressive is formed by using the past tense of the verb be with the present participle of a verb. The present participle is formed by adding ing to the end of a verb. If the verb ends in e and is more than three letters, the final e is dropped.

I	was going
you	were going
he / she / it	was going
we	were going
they	were going

Beispiele

What were you doing?	Was haben Sie gemacht?
I was walking to the store when you phoned.	Ich war auf dem Weg zum Laden, als Sie anriefen.
The dog was sleeping when I walked by.	Der Hund schlief, als ich vorbeikam.
We were thinking about going to Costa Rica for our vacation, but eventually decided to go to Ecuador instead.	Wir dachten an einen Urlaub in Costa Rica, entschieden uns dann aber doch für Ecuador.